Sarah Grundy, a 2012 Pinckney Community High School graduate, died Thursday morning. The 19-year-old was hospitalized for eight months after a March 2013 bonfire accident. / Provided photo

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DAILY PRESS & ARGUS

A Pinckney-area teen, finally home after eight months of hospitalization due to a 2013 bonfire accident, died this morning.

Sarah Grundy is being remembered by her family and friends as a “brave” and “inspiring” 19-year-old. Today was her half-birthday.

“It was totally a shock,” mother Sandy Lavey-Grundy said. “She was perfectly fine when she went to sleep last night.”

Grundy suffered burns covering 86 percent of her body in March after a bonfire accident at her family’s home in the Pingree Road area off M-36. The teen and her triplet Ashlee, who are 2012 Pinckney Community High School graduates, were having a small bonfire in the home’s backyard when “things just kind of went wrong,” according to Lavey-Grundy, who declined to elaborate.

The fourth-generation Pinckney-area resident was treated at University of Michigan Hospital in Ann Arbor, where she received dozens of skin surgeries, and was released Nov. 22 after being moved to the hospital’s rehabilitation unit.

The cause of death is pending an autopsy by the Livingston County medical examiner’s office. Lavey-Grundy said her daughter’s death could be related to an infection she contracted last weekend, for which she was prescribed antibiotics.

The Pinckney-area community raised more than $15,000 for the Grundy family since the accident to help counter hospital bills, according to Lavey-Grundy.

Putnam Township Fire Chief Greg Amburgey said it’s a “tragic” incident for the family, as well as his department. Fire officials hosted a fundraiser for the Grundy family in July that raised about $3,000.

Livingston County medical examiner’s office officials estimate six to eight weeks for release of the autopsy.